New tool

Today I was able to take some time and play around with a new web 2.0 tool Jing. Jing is a program that allows a user to capture screen shots. The framing of the Jing guidlines for the screen shot is really user friendly. However, it did take me one run through before I was able to achieve the screen diemensions to capture  the image with little modification to the box. Although I do like how the window pops up and allows you to name and then share right from the pop up window. I like the placement of the Jing sun (top middle on my pc and top right hand corner on my mac) as it allows really easy screen shot access and organization. I think Jing is an excellent companion to clipmarks as this program allows users to capture text up to 1000 words and store it in the same manner as the Jing screen captures. Clipmarks has helped me capture important paragraphs and quotes, many of which I later posted as content of blog entries and even posted right from clipmarks to this blog (scroll down a bit and you’ll see). I see the same potential for Jing. I am going to work screen captures into blog entries and use them in sections of “how to instructionals” when introducing new tools and assignments to students.  I do see potential classroom applications for this particularly when students are working at gathering information and moving them away from the cut and paste they are so used to. Below is my first trial using Jing. I captured a shot from Slightly Shumay, our class social network blog section. After Earth day we had a lot of great blog discussions about being more envronmetally friendly and how we could all effect change.